The Machines of Coldharbour Mill

Coldharbour Mill is a working wool museum.
Il produces worsted yarn for knitting and for weaving.
It also produces worsted cloth.

The Mill specialises in a type of sheep’s wool called “worsted The word “worsted” has several meanings:

• a type of wool produced by some sheep
• a yarn with long fibres
• cloth made from worsted yarn

Worsted’s long fibres permit the yarn not only to have great strength but to be thin too; an ideal combination for making fine cloth.

The Mill also has several industrial looms on which it weaves worsted cloth, including several kinds of tartan designed by Ian Gammon, engineer at The Mill.

There are some very old machines for spinning and weaving; the oldest is over a hundred years old.
It is in perfect working order and in daily use, like most of the other machines.

Even the newest machine is over sixty years old.

Follow the blue links across the top of the page to travel through the worsted yarn making process, starting with The Gill Box

Victorian Spinning in the Twentieth Century - a short film showing the process
of making worsted yarn at Coldharbour Mill.             Film duration 12 minutes